July 25 (Bloomberg) -- Geneva’s private banks could burnish
their image by helping to fix leaky roofs and remove asbestos
from their hometown’s United Nations buildings, according to
Michael Moller, who’s in charge of raising renovation funds.

Moller is tapping private banks busy rebuilding their
reputations after the global crackdown on offshore tax evasion.
They could volunteer to stump up part of the 837 million Swiss
francs ($928 million) needed to renovate the UN’s main center
for diplomatic talks as member countries are unwilling to foot
the entire bill, he said.

Helping rebuild the Palace of Nations, which has cemented
Geneva’s reputation as a center of peace talks, would be the
right thing for the banks to do for the city that hosts them,
Moller, acting director-general of the UN’s Geneva office, said
in an interview. Less than two miles away in the city center,
more than 4,000 asset managers, advisers and 120 banks have
helped Switzerland amass $2.3 trillion of cross-border wealth.

“The banks are going to have to re-brand themselves,”
Moller said, speaking in his office inside the complex, known
locally as the Palais. “It’s their joint responsibility to do
this, and it’s in their interest.”

The Danish diplomat is trying to raise funds for the
project, which the UN aims to start in 2017. He’s also targeting
other companies that might want to name part of a building or a
room in the 80-year-old hilltop complex that hosted political
deals such as the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan
in 1989.

Moller’s Mission

Moller, 61, who started a 12-month term in November
overseeing the UN’s second-largest hub, wants contributions for
the site that in the past nine months hosted diplomatic talks on
Syria’s civil war and Iran’s nuclear work.

The 193-member organization approved an overhaul of its
headquarters in New York in 2006. The cost of that project has
increased to $2.14 billion from an initial estimate of $1.88
billion.

Geneva’s Palais was constructed between 1929 and 1937 to
host meetings of the League of Nations, the UN’s defunct
predecessor. The buildings contain 34 conference rooms and 2,800
workspaces, which isn’t enough to house all the UN staff, 1,200
of whom work in rented offices elsewhere in Geneva. The reforms
will add 700 workspaces.

Asbestos

Offices are stifling in summer without air conditioning and
some roofs leak. Parts of the complex don’t meet safety
standards, with inadequate access for fire trucks, insufficient
escape routes for the disabled and electrical cables that don’t
comply with regulations as they could release toxic fumes.
Asbestos, the heat-resistant material that was phased out of
construction sites because it can damage the lungs, still
lingers in walls throughout the site, according to the UN.

It won’t be easy to dredge Swiss banks for donations.
Switzerland is under “heavy pressure” because of the
proportion of client assets originating in developed economies
where authorities are trying to recoup undeclared funds stashed
in Swiss banks, Boston Consulting Group said in a report last
month.

Banks have been closing accounts of Americans and Europeans
who don’t come clean on unpaid taxes as their governments target
advisers that opened hidden accounts for them. Low interest
rates and unstable trading income have also curbed profits since
the financial crisis.

Peace Role

Geneva’s wealth-management industry helped the city place
ninth in a global ranking of financial centers published by
Y/Zen Group in March, Geneva Financial Center said in its 2013
annual report.

Moller, who has worked more than three decades in the UN,
said he’s campaigning to persuade skeptics to maintain the
Palais’s role in international peace resolution.

Diplomatic workers in Geneva are often envied more for
their Swiss-franc salaries that are exempt from local taxes and
flight allowances than for the UN’s policy achievements such as
the Millennium Development Goals and attempts to protect human
rights. Some UN officials have access to a duty-free store with
liquor, champagne and cigarettes.

Caterpillar Inc.’s Swiss office helped it save more than
$2.4 billion in U.S. taxes, according to a U.S. Senate report in
March. Cincinnati, Ohio-based Procter & Gamble Co. is Geneva’s
third-biggest private-sector employer.

Millionaire Network

Moller declined to name companies he is targeting to help
pay for the renovations, or say what his career plans are after
his one-year mandate as acting director-general ends.

In the meantime, to seek funds for the Palais he’s
developing a network of millionaire bankers from Geneva’s oldest
financial dynasties, including Ivan Pictet, a former senior
managing partner at the city’s biggest bank Pictet & Cie. Group
SCA, and the chairman of the investment committee of the $54.2
billion UN Joint Staff Pension Fund.

It’s in everyone’s interest to maintain Geneva -- a city
that hosts 30 international organizations, 250 international
non-governmental organizations and 172 states represented by a
permanent mission -- as the “preeminent” center for peace
talks, Moller said during the interview.

“Everybody is here,” he said. “They are all here because
everybody else is here. Together, they are able to have a much
greater impact.”

It’s also important to alter the image of a city that is
too expensive as a location for diplomats to hold more than
11,000 meetings a year, Moller added.

“There’s a perception that it’s all sitting around the
lake eating cheese and chocolate,” he said. “We are working on
global public good. The very identity of Switzerland is what we
do here.”